House Elections panel to review Dayton campaign board appointees

Gov. Mark Dayton's three most recent appointees to the state of Minnesota's campaign watchdog board are coming up for review by the House Elections Committee.

The panel is scheduled to meet Tuesday morning for an overview of the appointments of Christian Sande, Ed Oliver and Jon Stafsholt to the Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board. Oliver's appointment is the most notable, as he served from 1993 to 2002 as a state senator from western Hennepin County.

When Dayton appointed Oliver last summer for a term that expires in 2017, he became the second former GOP legislator that the Democratic governor tapped for the campaign finance board. Former state representative Neil Peterson of Bloomington was the first.

The board's current chairwoman is also a former state lawmaker. Deanna Wiener is a former DFL senator from Eagan.

Dayton's other two appointees up for review by the House panel are Christian Sande, a private attorney who once ran for secretary of state as a Democrat; and Jon Stafsholt, a retired district judge from the state's Eighth Judicial District in west-central Minnesota.

A Duluth native who just barely lost Virginia's GOP gubernatorial primary said that politicians have not gone far enough in condemning the left for violence during a rally of white nationalists in Charlottesville. "I think that the left is going to try to use this as an excuse to crack down on conservative free speech," said Corey Stewart. "I think they're going to try to use this as an excuse to remove more historical monuments."